X-Message-Number: 4520 From: (Thomas Donaldson) Subject: Re: CryoNet #4512 - #4516 Date: Sat, 17 Jun 1995 20:22:19 -0700 (PDT) Hi again! About the FDA: One interesting development in the US Republican Party is that reform of the FDA has been raised as a serious goal. Naturally that tendency deserves every support we can give it, in the midst of our own work to improve our methods. In the long term, the FDA MAY become one of our enemies... or the efforts to restrict it will have succeeded. I certainly believe that we should work towards reversible cryopreservation of brains. Just how to handle it when it comes seems an open question: lots of things may be different, some better, some worse. I'll also say that if we have to argue that someone suspended this way is "alive", then clearly there will be plenty of people arguing on the other side. Since the FDA is (now) a very conservative organization, it may be one of those arguing that the suspended brain is NOT alive. This will leave us in much the same LEGAL situation as we are now. And even if the FDA signs on as an enemy of cryonics, that possibility simply tells us that foreign societies may deserve more support than they now receive, as refuges for the rest of us. As for what I HOPE, I hope that by then the FDA either will simply not exist, or will still exist as a far smaller agency with, perhaps, only the power to decide that a brand of drug has been adulterated or not. And there is some reason to believe that this hope will come true. If your congressman is a Republican, you might write him about the FDA. Saul Kent has been fighting the FDA for some time, and I'm sure that anyone who contacts him to do something in this battle will get a nice reception. Best and long long life, Thomas Donaldson Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=4520